


with your hands around my neck

by nutellamuffin



Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: Angst, Drabble, Fluff and Angst, and napoleon has never loved completely, and they're both just a MESS, but they cope very differently, don't know if i'm entirely proud of this but hhhh, ignoring canon (again), illya has never been loved, illya runs, in every sense of the word, it's complicated - Freeform, look - Freeform, napoleon has Trauma, napoleon pouts, so does Illya, waverly catches on
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-08-10
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:13:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25818640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nutellamuffin/pseuds/nutellamuffin
Summary: a year ago, illya made the choice that the phrase “every man for himself” could go to hell.
Relationships: Illya Kuryakin/Napoleon Solo
Comments: 4
Kudos: 50





	with your hands around my neck

**Author's Note:**

> title is from arctic monkeys' "505", the line "i'll probably still adore you with your hands around my neck, or i did last time i checked".
> 
> i finished this around 2-3 am, so near the end it might start to get wonky, please correct me in the comments. (might’ve put a word or two in french and not realized.)

illya didn’t know whether to thank the past or condemn it. it wasn’t a hard choice most of the time, especially for him; why would you thank a past that had thrown you into cold, dark reality at ten years old, that had taken both your parents from you even when one was still around, that had put you through the races in every sense until you got where you were now? angry, and cold, the corners of your vision tinted red with every step, fists clenched around something you couldn’t break back into place. why would you thank that?

unfortunately, it wasn’t that black and white. not anymore.

a year ago, he had been put on a side mission with napoleon while gaby was away. a year ago, something in him snapped, and for once it wasn’t anger. no, something in him snapped when napoleon began to flinch in his sleep, when he avoided outlets and electric plugs and vinciguerra island flashed across his eyes at the sight of every one. 

and this was a man he now trusted, this was a man who showed him why he could do so, this was a man who he had saved from that goddamn chair and wasn’t about to sit back and watch it take him again.

a year ago, illya made the choice that the phrase “every man for himself” could go to hell.

_“napoleon.” illya had never been a deep sleeper. that was how he was trained, sleep with one eye open, keep one hand on the gun under your pillow. it wasn’t hard to hear the american stir in his bed, much less to notice him up and leave the room._

_and the agent, in question, was bracing himself against the counter, knuckles white, as if someone was trying to tear the hotel down. eyes shut tight that flew open the moment illya entered the room. as if he’d been caught, somehow. but caught in what?_

_(vulnerability. always, plainly. napoleon solo was not_ **_vulnerable._ ** _he was cunning, quick witted, sly and sarcastic, but he wasn’t vulnerable. not for one second, not for anybody. yet here he stood.)_

_when he replied, his voice shook like the building really was being torn down, like someone had a gun pointed to his head. (or a strap around his head and bound to an electric chair. he could see this, he knew this, the wild look in his eyes. illya wore it some nights. but he was never caught.)_

_“illya. i, ah, was just thirsty.” napoleon cleared his throat and turned his back to the counter, (where there was no tap running, not even a glass,) and illya could see his eyes shift, even in the dark._

_illya kuryakin was as kind of a man as napoleon solo was a vulnerable one, you only knew it if they let you. you had to_ **_earn_ ** _it, at least with illya. he was not a kind man, he was not caring, his emotions were under lock and key. he would likely kill you more than give you a hug, and if you tried, he’d deck you. on a good day._

_at least, that is what he had to be to survive._

_here, in this dark hotel suite kitchen, with this man illya had trusted for nearly three years, (this man, who had been haunted for two, who had never let illya help him, who was too scared of being the vulnerable man nobody knew he could be,) with this man that illya cared for too much as a partner and furthermore as a person close to him to see him suffer, he did not have to survive. he just had to_ **_exist_ ** _, and moreso, he had to_ **_help him._ **

_so he did. he got him a glass of water, and when his eyes were still wild, made him sit down to breathe. (you would never think illya would know how to take care of someone. but watching and never helping made you think about what you’d do if you could.)_

_and slowly, ever so slowly, napoleon began to talk. what truly haunted him at night, why he felt he had to prove himself still worthy. (why he shut everyone out. why he hid from every aid.) by the end of it, illya couldn’t help but notice that napoleon’s chair was closer than it was before. and when they fell into a silence that wasn’t uncomfortable, sat on their shoulders like a blanket instead of a boulder, napoleon took illya’s hand. and just as quickly, yanked it away. illya surprised himself when he ever so gently guided it back._

_and these hands, they’d hurt people, napoleon had seen it. these hands had_ **_killed_ ** _people, these hands had broken necks and shattered bones and punched people square in the jaw without hesitating, and yet. these hands were holding napoleon as if he might break, and napoleon felt the most safe when he had these hands in his own._

_even more surprisingly, napoleon didn’t object, even interlaced their fingers. and he felt the little tremors in illya’s fingers, the ones that only seemed to go away when he was cocking a gun or slitting someone’s throat, and he asked, “you’re shaking, is everything alright?”_

**_was everything alright?_ ** _illya didn’t know how to answer. he was sitting here, in this kitchen, because he was worried whether or not everything was alright for napoleon. and here he was, playing the hero again, (just because that’s who he was, just because that was who he had to be,) and illya was supposed to be the one asking that question._

_when he didn’t answer, too wrapped up in the possible replies to even decide, napoleon piped up once again. and his voice was gentler, more tentative, that spoke paragraphs more that didn’t reach his mouth._

_“can i make it better?”_

_and he did. it was unlike anything illya had ever imagined; it was softer, it was sweeter. and maybe he hadn’t expected love to be this gentle, because the only love he’d ever known was a drunk mother whose husband was across the country, and for once it wasn’t empty wine bottles and hurt. it was a pair of lips that felt like satin while the world was sleeping, and nothing more- but he realized, he didn’t need more._

a year ago, illya had allowed himself to indulge in a fantasy for a week. until the hotel key was turned in, and they were tossed back out into the world again, and the russian was met face first with the realization that _this couldn’t happen._ for so many reasons he lost track. (because the world was cruel to people like them. because illya was the monster in a new way from where he came from. because they couldn’t continue working side by side like this, not now. because illya wasn’t ready to lose himself to attachment.)

and so illya had been running. it was what he did best. privately requesting to be put on lone missions. to clear his head, he said. i work better alone, he said. waverly didn't question it until he saw illya leave a meeting unnoticed once napoleon entered the door, and the sudden change in behaviour clicked.

he didn’t know what had happened, whether they had argued, or something . . . else. so he proposed what he thought was a foolproof plan; a mission without any real danger, no interruptions, so they could finally be over with this _shenanigan_ of theirs. though he knew neither of them would agree.

they were to meet their mystery partner in the hotel room. illya didn't question it, until he walked into their suite and saw napoleon sitting on the chair. and suddenly a year of running didn’t seem to resolve so easily anymore.

napoleon had gone back to normal as a defence mechanism. (whatever normal was, whatever normal could be. napoleon solo, a womanizer, obnoxious, sarcastic son of a bitch. _that_ was normal. and he hated it. but who you are and who you need to be to survive are two very different things.)

if he said it hadn’t hurt, he’d be lying. (he opened himself up to him, he’d allowed him to see a side of him that _no one_ had ever seen and he left, simple as that.) and napoleon tried, he tried to forget that it seemed so _easy_ for illya to do just that. _forget._ leave napoleon behind and pretend it never happened.

it made him wonder how many times he had done this.

was this routine for him? catch someone at a vulnerable moment, sit with them, let them talk. steal a kiss, steal a heart, leave it behind three days later. (illya was a shadow and he left like one, too. undetected, unnoticed until it was gone. terribly hard to ignore its absence.)

and here he was, standing right in front of him a year later. three hundred and sixty-five days of waiting for something napoleon knew would never happen, and for it to actually happen and _hate_ it.

he wanted to get a glass of water from the kitchen and splash it in his face. he wanted to yell at him, curse him out, make some dig at him like when they first met because he _knew_ how. that was good old napoleon solo for you, after all. (who he’d had to turn back to. who he’d had to drown out the pain with.)

he wanted to take who he had to change into to ignore how he felt about illya and use it against him. but he didn’t. he sat in silence, stared at the man closing the door like it was porcelain, and waited for him to make the first move.

illya couldn’t breathe. he wasn’t an idiot, he knew what he’d done. he knew how it would affect napoleon, to some degree. (because napoleon was still a mystery to him. why he trusted him, why he felt safe around him. why he handed over his heart to _him._ illya would never understand the way napoleon used to look at him. like he was some sort of god, like he was worthy of being napoleon’s world. it scared him more than anything else.)

and now napoleon was looking at him in a way he’d never expected and a way he never wanted to. staring him down, like he was daring him to take a step further, to see what happened. and also . . . pain. such raw hurt behind his irises that twisted illya’s stomach up in knots with guilt, and he didn’t even know where to _start_ to fix it. he didn’t even know if he could.

how did you fix someone else when you didn’t even know how to fix yourself?

napoleon knew, to some degree, why illya had done what he had. anyone would know, one _look_ at him and you could probably put two and two together. and perhaps he had been naïve, to think that he’d change for just napoleon, but he had thought he’d been . . . different. like he wouldn’t scare illya off, like he wouldn’t think he’d have to destroy what they had to save it. (what an oxymoron they were, breaking their bond to keep it safe.)

then he asked him the question that illya had been asking himself for a year now.

"why did you run?"

they hadn’t talked in nearly three hundred and sixty-five days. the last time they did, illya had promised himself that no one deserved to be alone. (no one, except himself. no one deserved to hurt, except illya. when he was _running_ , when he was pushing away the only real love he’d ever gotten, because he knew he didn’t deserve it. because he _thought_ he didn’t deserve it.)

there was a long pause before the answer, and the silence wasn’t like it was a year ago. this one beared down on you, tortured you, put your heart in a blender on the highest setting. this silence choked you.

"why did you not follow me?"

napoleon didn’t know how to answer that. and he could see, in illya’s own eyes, (that should be wild, should be narrowed and dangerous and dark, but were only light, and god, they were so blue,) that he had been holding onto that, just that. that if he really did deserve this love, napoleon would’ve followed him, asked more questions, maybe.

illya didn’t believe in fate, but he believed in napoleon.

“i suppose we both let each other down in that sense.” he answered, looking off to the side. (because illya looked so _raw,_ and napoleon had never seen him like that, not ever- never so guilty, never so ashamed, never so sorry.)

illya didn’t answer.  
  
  
  



End file.
